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Why do I not believe you or your sources? Hasn't Havoc commented extensively enough on the manner in which YOUR church creates documents, as needed, to establish the lengths to which YOUR church will go to promote their doctrines? Why should anyone doubt the keepers of Hosius' letters would make certain none would survive that could contradict YOUR church's beliefs?

Just as I thought, it is a conspiracy. If we made sure none of Cardinal Hosius' letters survived, how did you guys get a copy? Oh wait I know, after the Baptist Magazine got a hold of them in 1826, then we shredded them. That’s the ticket.

Pegleg will give you the website address - he gave it to me.

I got more if you want them.

Just as I thought, it is a conspiracy. If we made sure none of Cardinal Hosius' letters survived, how did you guys get a copy? Oh wait I know, after the Baptist Magazine got a hold of them in 1826, then we shredded them. That’s the ticket

The synod convened in Piotrków in 1552 ordered all Roman Catholics to submit to a test of orthodoxy of their faith designed by Stanislaus Hosius, then Bishop of Warmia. Pope Paul IV sent his Nuncio Aloysius Lippomani who suggested the most sanguinary methods to eradicate heresy, arguing that violence was justified and recommended seizure of the leaders and their execution.

Voltaire

The Reformation, established in Poland relatively late, ca 1550, inspired the most advanced legislature in Europe of its time as regards to freedom of conscience and equality of religious denominations. However, it did not last for long since it was met with the fierce and ruthless Counter Reformation organized by the Catholic Church that succeeded in destroying the Protestant churches and eliminating religious freedoms. Just as Spain distinguished itself for expelling Jews and Moslems in 1492, so Poland has the dubious distinction for expelling some of its best sons and daughters, a group known under various names as the Polish Brethren, Antitrinitarians, Arians, Unitarians, or abroad as Socinians. This was justified to support King John Casimir's religious vow to the Holy Virgin to avenge the denial of the Divine Trinity by "heretics", an act deemed most blasphemous according to Catholic ideology.

One of the leaders of this group was Francesco Lismanini, noted above, who openly embraced Protestantism during his stay in Geneva, and Zürich. Their aim was to reform the Church without affecting its orthodoxy. Members of this society recommended reading and discussing the Gospels and attacked the Church's tenets that did not have scriptural justification, such as the mystery of the Trinity, one of the antitrinitarian doctrines of Michael Servetus, and the idolatry and worship of saints.

Stanislaus Hosius (1504-1579), cardinal since 1561, was the single individual who contributed most to the defeat of the Reformation. Hosius proposed exile of all priests embracing Reformation ideas and expulsion of all Protestant ministers, Polish and foreign. He held a special grudge against the Antitrinitarians and the Bohemian Brethren whom he considered the most dangerous.

Hosius conceived of the idea of bringing in the Jesuits. At his request the first group arrived in 1564 and was settled and endowed in Braunsberg. Slowly the Order was spread to all Poland, endowed with churches, hospitals and schools. Its goal was to restore Papal supremacy regardless of Polish national interests, individual human rights, and moral principles. He, with other Jesuits, argued that the Warsaw Statutes of 1573, were a "criminal conspiracy against God" and should be abolished by the King. He openly recommended to King Henri de Valois to retract his oath maintaining that an oath given to "heretics" may be broken even without an absolution. He even commissioned the King's confessor, William Ruzeus to explain to the King his "duty" to break the oath. Papal Nuncio Gratiani, advised the King to crush religious and political liberties, offer offices only to Catholics and to engage in a war with Muscovy to keep the nation from religious discussions and intellectual pursuits.

Beginning with the reign of Stefan Batory (1575-1586), the clergy and Jesuits launched a continuous and methodical campaign against Protestants and the law of the pax dissidentium that lasted until the complete success of the Counter Reformation in the middle of the XVIIth century. Several methods were used by Jesuits to achieve their goals.

The most primitive was to use brutal physical force. The Jesuits and Hosius openly instigated mobs, school pupils and university students to organize pogroms, attacks, desecrations of burial grounds, and murder against Protestants. King Batory, influenced by Jesuits, was involved in one case of expulsion of the rector of the Socinian school at Chmielnik, Christian Francken. He also imprisoned Alexis Radecki, a Socinian printer.

Jesuits strived to gain control over education. They achieved it by the end of the reign of King Zygmunt August III (1587-1632). They used schools as a training ground for their puppets who were then promoted to political and civil offices, to the Sejm and to the courts. By control of education Jesuits were able to indoctrinate youth with hatred towards Protestants. The students who organized the pogroms defended themselves on the ground that it was their duty to destroy the Protestants just as the clergy had taught them.

Jesuits destroyed the concepts of law and individual rights replacing them by prejudice and corruption. The King allowed himself and the country to be controlled by Jesuits with total disregard for national interests. He achieved more by corruption than by open persecution. Abolishment of the laws was instituted methodically, step by step. It began with the Sejm of 1588 which allowed action to be brought by the Catholic Church for recovery of its former property thus abrogating the law of 1556 granting the nobles freedom of worship.

Another method of exterminating Protestants was open impunity of all aggression against them. To the Jesuits every act of persecution and depravity committed against a Protestant was proof of piety. In 1611 a young Italian named Franco, who proclaimed that the Catholic Eucharist was nothing but idolatry, was condemned to death in Wilno and hastily executed in the courtyard of the castle. In Bielsk which belonged to the Queen Constantia, Archduchess of Austria, John Tyszkiewicz, a Socinian was executed on November 16, 1611, by her order for refusing to swear in the name of the Trinity. These examples clearly illustrate the power exerted by the clergy and breakdown of the moral sensitivities of Poles.

I wonder why there are no records of the statements made by Stanislaus Hosius the First Conservative mentioned, you don't think their could be any foul play do you?

Check this web site out, there is plenty more.